Chapter Two
Ink
I f I wasn’t with my brothers at the Los Diablos clubhouse, then I was drowning myself in work.
I should have taken an hour to go grab a meal with Fer like I usually did. But with her immediately taking the new girl under her wing, I didn’t want to encroach on their girl time or whatever the fuck bitches called that shit nowadays.
Besides, I had designs to draft up for some of my more finicky clients. I didn’t have time to hang with them, and I had even less desire to get to know the new chick.
She wouldn’t last the fucking week anyway, of that I was positive.
Beatriz was an old friend of the club, and when she asked if I could give her cousin a job, I would be remiss to say no. We owed her, and I needed a secretary. With a rise in our clientele, I needed Fer piercing in the back, not dealing with shit in the front.
But after asking Beatriz about her cousin, I’d regretted saying yes without inquiring first. It sounded like she was irresponsible and couldn’t hold a job if her life depended on it. That didn’t bode well, and I didn’t have the time or patience to deal with someone’s bullshit. So at the first sign of trouble, I’d fire her ass with no remorse.
Beatriz be damned.
The pencil scratched across the piece of paper, crisscrossing in different degrees of pressure until I’d finally formed an eye.
The piece I was working on was a naked body. My client wanted to immortalize his girl on his skin and was willing to pay a pretty penny for it.
Which meant I had to work overtime to deliver something spectacular. Devil’s Ink had a reputation to uphold, after all.
I expected perfection from everyone who worked with me, which made me even more wary of the new girl.
I let my mind go zen as I worked on my project. I didn’t stop until the door of the shop chimed and Fer’s voice filtered in. I set my pencil to the side, feeling a small cramp work its way through my fingers. I shook it off and stood up, moving to the front.
My eyes strayed to the new girl almost immediately, narrowing on every inch of her. Everything about her spelled trouble. The little chola’s big, doe eyes weren’t fooling me at all. They were innocent, almost overly so. I didn’t trust anyone like that.
It was the Diablo in me.
Our club was involved in guns, sometimes drugs if Loco–the club prez–wanted us to get the extra cash. We lived through dangerous situations every day. It made us wary of everyone and everything.
Especially a pretty face.
She chewed on her plump bottom lip, fighting back a smile as Fer went on about some story or other. I barely heard Fer’s words, focused on inhaling every reaction, every expression the new girl made.
Finally, her body tensed like prey catching onto the hint of a predator. Slowly, that dark gaze slid up to me and widened.
She stared at me like I was a fucking ogre, and I couldn’t say why that pissed me off more than it probably should have.
“Stop fucking gossiping and get back to work,” I snapped.
She jerked back as if I’d slapped her, and her surprised expression morphed into a more serious, almost cold one.
“Yes, sir,” she replied and hurried back around the desk to fiddle with the mouse of the computer.
I watched for a minute longer as she stiffly logged info into the spreadsheet before I turned and went back to my work space.
I sensed Fer following me.
I knew what was coming, so it came as no surprise that her fist punched out at my arm in passing.
I sighed.
“Eres un pendejo,” she admonished in a whisper, tossing her purse down in her area.
“I’m also your boss,” I reminded her sternly.
I didn’t need to look at her to know she was rolling her eyes.
“Please,” she scoffed. “You won’t fire me.”
She was right.
She was also the exception.
I’d known Fer for years, and she had gone above and beyond proving her loyalty to me and the club. She worked her ass off here at Devil’s Ink and had quickly become family. A person the MC would ride and die for.
In private, she could joke like this.
In public, she knew better.
“She’s a nice girl,” Fer continued as she washed her hands in a far sink and grabbed sanitary spray to clean her area.
“You had one lunch with her.”
She winked. “One lunch is all I need to gauge if someone’s buena gente or not. Trust me, she’s a good one.”
“There are a lot of good ones,” I scoffed.
But good didn’t mean jack shit in our world and this woman, Xiomara Nava, didn’t belong in it at all.